Teixeira beats incumbent in close race

A glowing Marv Teixiera grinned into the television at his Station Grille party Tuesday at 9 p.m. and raised his vodka tonic high.

He just found out he's the next mayor of Carson City, beating eight-year incumbent Ray Masayko with 51.5 percent of the city's votes.

"I think it was Bulldog Louie," he quipped, referring to the bulldog in his campaign ads. "I think he won it for me."

When preliminary results earlier in the evening showed a similar margin, he said he was surprised.

Polls conducted a month ago by his is campaign manager, Donald Carlson, implied he was behind Masayko, but slowly closing in.

"I guess I closed in pretty good," Teixeira said.

A total of 22,116 Carson City residents voted in the mayor's race. Teixeira won by 654 votes, with a total of 11,384. Masayko was just short with 10,732.

Over at the Carson Nugget's dwindling Rotary Club party, Masayko nursed a Bud Lite and congratulated his adversary.

"I'm disappointed, but I'm not crushed," Masayko said. "The people I work for told me they want a change and I accept it. Congratulations to Marv."

Teixeira gave kudos to Masayko for running a clean campaign.

"I respect him for it."

He said he has his work cut out for him.

"The city has some healing to do between counties," he said. "We have to take inventory with our major retailers. We can't afford to lose any more."

Throughout his campaign, Teixeira said city officials need to aggressively court and retain large retailers within city limits.

But before he takes office in January, he said, he'll take his wife, Liz, to Hawaii and work on his golf game in Palm Springs.

"I'll take office with a charged battery," he said.

Masayko said golf is high on his list, too. As for future plans and political aspirations, he said he doesn't have any now, but "never say never."

Contact reporter Robyn Moormeister at rmoormeister@nevadaappeal.com or 881-1217.